IBRAHIM HALAWA HAS said that his Irish passport is being held by Egyptian authorities and he is trying to get it back.
Speaking on Today FM’s The Last Word programme, Halawa rejected as falsehoods statements that were spread online that he had ripped up his Irish passport.
“I actually don’t know how that story got around,” Halawa said.
“It’s with the Egyptian government at the moment, they fingerprinted me for it as well, they took my finger print from me to say they have it. So I’m trying to get it back, just to prove.”
When I was detained they said you have to have something that proves you’re an Irish citizen and they took it away from me and they said we’ll keep it with your file of charges and your whole file of the case to say you’re able to get consular visits with that Irish passport.
“So they took it because at the time that was the only ID I had, I was only 17 and I was walking around with it in Egypt because that was the only ID I had at the time. I’m trying to get it back, the Irish Embassy in Egypt are trying to get it back. I didn’t tear up my passport, it’s total nonsense, whoever spread that rumour.”
Halawa also spoke about adapting to life back home in Dublin. He said it has been challenging and that he’s not quite used to life again as a free man but is adjusting. He told the programme that people have been mostly supportive of him that and people have come up to him saying nice things.
“Walking down Grafton Street, a lot of people stop me for selfies. It’s very heartwarming,” he said.
After he was exonerated by an Egyptian court, Halawa returned to Ireland last month after more than four years in various Cairo jails.
Halawa, from Firhouse in Dublin, was arrested during a protest in 2013 in support of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Morsi who had been elected by Egypt’s people before being ousted from power in a military coup.
He told Matt Cooper on today’s programme that he did not know much about the Muslim Brotherhood’s politics when he travelled to Egypt but attended the protest in support of democracy.
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